This was a big day! A lot of writing; I tried to cut it down to only the highlights. Lots of pictures, too.
 |
| StarPerú puddle-jumper |
I’m on a boat. Really. We’re headed down the Madre de Dios River on our way to the
lodge where we’re going to stay in the jungle. I think, riding down this magnificent river with impossible
amounts of foliage on both sides, after eating lunch off a banana leaf, it has
finally sunk in that I’m actually in Peru. It’s awesome.
Today started at four again,
although to be fair, I didn’t roll out of bed until forty-five minutes or so
later. Our flight (one hour via a StarPerú
puddle-jumper) stopped in Cuzco before taking us all the way to Puerto
Maldonado (which is proving very difficult to pronounce, for whatever reason).
 |
| Favorite Airplane |
Our tour guide Esteban met us at
the airport—if such a term can be used—with another sign. We waited
about fifteen minutes for the rest of our tour group, who came in on the next
flight. I ran across the parking
lot to spend part of that time taking pictures of this awesome plane. It was very old and really small, and
it made for some pretty fantastic photos.
“Favorite Plane” wasn’t a category I’d ever given much thought to, but
now I’ve got one. According to
Esteban, it carried Mormon missionaries to the country, which was both a good
and bad thing for the natives. We
then took a fortyish-minute bus ride down the scariest dirt road I’ve ever
seen, across several bridges reminiscent of a Busch Gardens safari ride where
the bridge gives out and you have to be “rescued.” None of these bridges gave out, miraculously. What were really interesting were all
of the unfinished bridges we saw along the way. Apparently builders got big ideas, started the bridges, then
decided to take the money and abandon the project. I said that when I became an engineer, I would come back and
finish all the bridges.
 |
| Notice the guy with the cooler |
We’ve been warned about naked natives who live deep in the jungle and will
shoot you with arrows for fear of disease if you get too close. That’s one thing Pepto Bismol won’t
protect against, I guess.
We have one flashlight among the
five of us for this jungle night walk, and discovered that we may not have the Deet. But it might be in my suitcase. Let’s hope!
Well, the good news is we found
the Deet. The bad news is now I
smell like bug spray.
Grosstastic. We haven’t
been shot by natives, which I supposed also qualifies as good news. We keep passing empty canoes on the
banks, though, each of which presumably held passengers at one point. Every time we pass one I inform
everyone that they were shot by natives.
It’s not completely accurate, I know, but the notion that they may also
have been eaten by piranhas is probably too much for our group...
We’re at the hotel now. We didn’t get shot by natives. There’s no
air conditioning, but there is toilet paper. Earlier today, at a stop on the river where we got out
passports stamped, I had to use some of my Charmin-On-the-Go.
 |
| The entrance to the lodge and some boats |
Our cabin has a great view of the
river. I’m out on the porch now
because the light inside is already too low. We have candles, but we’ve been warned to blow them out once
we go to bed lest we burn the wooden cabin down. We also have mosquito nets for our beds, which I find more
worrying than comforting, to be perfectly honest.
The night walk was fun for the
first half. We saw a tarantula,
which freaked everyone out. And
tons of vines in all crazy shapes and huge
trees. It was just like in the
movies, just a lot darker. I got bitten by two
mysterious Amazonian insects, the second of which was a normal-looking
ant. He may also have been the
first. I hope so.
 |
| It's gonna eat me! |
We were asked to conserve water in the shower, which wasn’t difficult
because the two choices are “off” and “freezing.” I do feel better now, though. Guess what time tomorrow starts? Four! Again.
